Objective Rheological properties and gelation properties of agar were investigated. Methods The gelling point,melting point and the gel strength of agar were detected with MCR101 rheometer and TA texture testing instrument. Results and Conclusion Rheological properties of agar were affected by its concentration ,temperature and the addition of salt (such as NaCl ,CaCl2) and sucrose. Apparent viscosity exhibited shear thinning behavior following the power law model. Apparent viscosity increased with the increase of concentration,and decreased with the rise of temperature. The decrease in viscosity followed an Arrhenius temperature dependence. Agar solutions exhibited typical "weak gel" properties by small strain oscillatory measurements. The results indicated that the agar solution was characterized as a gel properties ,and which could form a kind of heat reversible gel. The gelling point of agar was lower than its melting point. The gel strength of agar could be affected by its gel time,and the addition of salt (such as NaCl,CaCl2) and sucrose.

Objective To investigate the expression of FTO in gastric cancer tissues and the functional significance of FTO in MGC-803 cell line.Methods The FTO mRNA was detected by RT-qPCR in 54 cases of gastric cancer samples and their paired adjacent normal control tissues.The effect of FTO overexpression in MGC-803 on cell proliferation,cell migration and invasion were detected by CCK-8,wound heal and ranswell assays,respectively.Results The expression of FTO mRNA was significantly lower than that of adjacent tissues(P＜O.05).Furthermore,overexpression of FTO in MGC-803 cells inhibited cell proliferation,cell migration and invasion.Conclusions FTO is low expressed in gastric cancer tissues and inhibits gastric cancer cell line MGC-803 proliferation,migration and invasion.FTO is closely associated with the development of gastric cancer.

Objective:To investigate the correlations between CO-029 expression and cholangiocarcinoma invasion and metastasis, and the further explore the potential mechanism involved.Methods:The constructed lentiviral vector of vshRNA-CO-029 (LV/GFP/CO-029) was used to transfect and screen the stable transfected cholangiocarcinoma cell line HCCC-9810-vshRNA-CO-029 as the silence group, HCCC-9810 cells transfected with the mock plasmid were used as the mock group, and the untransfected cells were used as the control group. Cell scratch assay, Transwell assay and in vivo implantation assay were used to detect the migration, invasion and metastasis of the three groups of cells. Immunoprecipitation and tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-α stimulation assay were used to detect the effect of CO-029 on the expression of EMT-related genes.Results:The scratch healing rate of the silence group was (27.11±4.58)%, which was lower than that in mock group (92.84±6.24)%, the number of cells passing through Matrigel in silence group was (57.15±6.10), which was significantly lower than that in mock group (108.20±9.21) and control group (112.00±10.45), the differences were statistically significant ( all P<0.01). The volume of liver tumors in the silence group of orthotopic xenograft mouse model was (2.17±0.54) cm 3, while the volume of liver tumors in the transplanted simulation group was (0.74±0.15) cm 3, the differences were statistically significant ( P<0.05). The incidence of lung metastasis and the number of lung metastases in the simulated group was 100%(6/6) and (214.17±35.64), respectively, while that in the silence group was 16.7% (1/6) and (41.56±14.15), respectively, the differences were statistically significant (all P<0.05). Co-immunoprecipitation showed that CO-029 can form a complex with TNF-αR1. TNF-α induced the down-regulation of E-cadherin and up-regulation of vimentin and N-cadherin in the mock group, but no significant changes were observed in the silence group. Conclusion:CO-029 expression is positively correlated with tumor invasion and metastasis of cholangiocarcinoma, and could couple with TNF-α to induce EMT, which is a novel well-established potential prognostic and therapeutic target for cholangiocarcinoma metastasis and prognosis intervention.

Objective To investigate the efficacy and safety of vasopressin receptor antagonist tolvaptan for treating dilutional hyponatremia casused by decompensated liver cirrhosis.Methods Ninety-six subjects with decompensated liver cirrhosis complicated by dilutional hyponatremia were divided into test group (n =56) and control group (n =40) by double blind method.Test group were treated with a single dose of tolvaptan 15 mg orally in addition to routine therapy,while control group were treated with routine therapy plus placebo.The changes in serum sodium concentration,liver functions,ascites,and edema of lower extremities between the two groups were observed.Measurement data were compared by t test,and categorical data were compared by chisquare test.Results On day 7,36 (64.3％) patients in test group and 9 (22.5％) patients in control group reached normal serum sodium concentrations (x2 =5.241,P＜0.01).All the patients in test group and only 3 patients in control group had 24 hours' total urine volume above 3500 mL.Difference of 24 hours' total urine volume during 7-day treatment between the two groups was statistically significant (t=20.899,P＜0.01).Thirty-nine patients in test group and 15 patients in control group had reduced ascites (x2 =4.260,P=0.039),but improvement of edema in lower extremities of both groups was comparable (12 cases in test group and 7 cases in control group; x2 =0.227,P=0.634).Serum alanine aminotransferase (ALT),total bilirubin (TBil),potassium and creatinine levels of test group were improved after treatment,but were not significantly different from either baseline levels (t=1.509,0.783,1.107,1.237; both P＞0.05) or those of the control group (t=1.712,1.635,1.121,0.873; both P＞0.05).Conclusions Single dose of tolvaptan (15 mg) exerts a strong diuretic effect and is able to greatly increase serum sodium concentration,thus has distinct therapeutic effect for patients with decompensated liver cirrhosis complicated by dilutional hyponatremia.

Objective To investigate the effect and its significance of low-dose insulin on Nmethyl-D-aspartate receptor (NMDAR) level and its downstream signaling of c-Jun N-terminal kinase (JNK) and the extracellular signal-regulated protein kinase (ERK,p44/42MAPK) in streptozotocininduced diabetic rats.Methods Ten-week-old male SD rats were randomly divided into 3 groups:control group,diabetic group and insulin-treated diabetes group.Diabetes was induced by streptozocin (STZ,60mg/kg) injected intraperitoneally.Two weeks after STZ injection,insulin glargine (92u/day for 8 weeks) was subcutaneously injected in the insulin-treated diabetes group.Then,the rat lumbar spinal cords were collected.The protein levels of phospho-Insulin receptor substrate 1 (P-IRS1),phospho-NMDAR NR1 subunit (P-NR1),P-JNK and P-p44/42MAPK were evaluated by Western blotting.One week before the terminal of the study,paw thermal response latency was measured in all groups.Results Blood glucose levels were tremendously high in both the diabetic group and insulintreated diabetes group.Compared with the control group,paw thermal response latency was markedly shortened in the diabetic group (P＜ 0.001) and the insulin-treated diabetes group (P＜ 0.001),and the alteration was more pronounced in the diabetic group (P＜0.05).Compared with the control group,the protein levels of P-IRS1,P-NR1,P-JNK and P-p44/42MAPK were increased by 79.2％,35.1％,47.6 ％,64.3 ％ and 87.6 ％,respectively in diabetic group and 49.4 ％,19.1％,16.5 ％,31.8％ and 39.9％,respectively in insulin-treated diabetes group (all P＜0.001 or 0.05).In comparison with diabetic group,the increased amplitudes of above 4 parameters were decreased by 29.8％,16.0％,31.2％,32.5％ and 47.7％ respectively in the insulin-treated diabetes group (all P＜0.05).Conclusions NMDAR and its downstream signals,such as JNK and p42/44MARK,are involved in the pathogenesis of painful diabetic neuropathy.Although it could not efficiently control the blood glucose level,low-dose insulin treatment may partly inhibit the occurrence of thermal hyperalgesia through inhibiting NMDAR signal pathway.

Objective:To investigate the expressions and clinical significance of tetraspanin CO-029 and integrin αv in intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma (ICC ).Methods:Tissue microarray (TMA) was used to detect the expression of CO-029 and αv in 254 cases of intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma. The relationship between the two factors and clinicopathological features, recurrence, metastasis and prognosis was analyzed.Spearman method was used to analyze their correlation.Relationship between αv and CO-029 was studied by mass spectrometry and database search,immunoprecipitation and Western blot were used to detect the coexistence.Results:Tissue microarray analysis showed that the positive expression rate of CO-029 was 51.6% (131/254), and the positive expression rate of αv was 61.4% (156/254). The expression of CO-029 and αv were closely correlated with tumor envelope, size, number and TNM stage ( P<0.05). According to the time of recurrence (TTR), the expressions of CO-029 and αv in early postoperative recurrence group (TTR <1 year) were significantly higher than those in non recurrence group (TTR ≥ 1 year). The patients with high CO-029 expression were more likely to relapse ( HR=2.01, 95% CI=1.45-2.79; P<0.001) and had shorter survival time ( HR=2.03, 95% CI=1.46-2.81; P<0.001). The patients with high expression of αv had shorter recurrence time ( HR=1.85, 95% CI=1.38-2.47; P<0.001) and shorter survival time ( HR=1.95, 95% CI=1.40-2.71; P<0.001). Co immunoprecipitation and Western blot confirmed that αv and CO-029 formed a complex. There was a positive correlation between CO-029 and αv in intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma ( r=0.401, P<0.01). Conclusions:The differential expression of CO-029 and αv were closely related to the recurrence, metastasis and prognosis of intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma, and CO-029 may couple with αv to form a complex to promote the invasion and metastasis of intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma.

Objective To observe the effects of percutaneous endoscopic gastrostomy (PEG)on mortality and complications in patients with persistent dysphagia after stroke using a points scoring system for selecting PEG indication.Methods A total of 75 patients were divided into low score group without PEG,high score group without PEG and low score group with PEG (n=25 each).The follow-up period was 18 months,and the differences in complications,mortalities and survival periods among groups were compared.Results The number of times of aspiration pneumonia was (1.36± 1.44) in low score group,(1.96±2.28) in high score group,(0.36±0.64) in low score group with PEG,with statistically significant differences among three groups (H=7.148,P=0.028).No difference in the morbidity of aspiration pneumonia was found between low score group and high score group (P=0.189).The number of times of aspiration pneumonia was decreased in low score groups after PEG versus in low score group without PEG (P=0.030) and in high score group (P＜0.01).The numberof times of gastrointestinal hemorrhage was (0.48± 0.77)in low score group,(0.64± 0.91) in high score group,(0.12±0.33) in low score group with PEG,with statistically significant differences among three groups (H=5.532,P =0.063).No statistically significant difference in gastrointestinal hemorrhage was found between low score groups and low score group after PEG (P=0.430),as well as between low score group and low score group with PEG (P=0.079).The morbidity of gastrointestinal hemorrhage was lower in low score group than in high score group (P=0.012).The survival rate at the observation end was 88.0％ (22/25),52.0％ (13/25) and 92.0％ (23/25) in low score group,high score group and low score group with PEG,respectively,with statistically significant difference among the three groups (x2 =7.906,P =0.001).Kaplan-Meier survival curve showed that the survival period were longer in the low score group with or without PEG than in high score group (P＜0.01),but no statistically significant difference was found between low score groups with or without PEG (P=0.626).Conclusions The reasonable evaluation using a points-scoring system before PEG might predict the prognosis of such patients:the higher score would indicate higher mortality.PEG operation for low score group with better condition could decrease the aspiration pneumonia and decrease gastrointestinal hemorrhage significantly,but could not prolong general survival time and decrease general mortality.

Focal cortical dysplasia (FCD) is one of the most common causes of drug-resistant epilepsy. Dysmorphic neurons are the major histopathological feature of type II FCD, but their role in seizure genesis in FCD is unclear. Here we performed whole-cell patch-clamp recording and morphological reconstruction of cortical principal neurons in postsurgical brain tissue from drug-resistant epilepsy patients. Quantitative analyses revealed distinct morphological and electrophysiological characteristics of the upper layer dysmorphic neurons in type II FCD, including an enlarged soma, aberrant dendritic arbors, increased current injection for rheobase action potential firing, and reduced action potential firing frequency. Intriguingly, the upper layer dysmorphic neurons received decreased glutamatergic and increased GABAergic synaptic inputs that were coupled with upregulation of the Na⁺-K⁺-Cl^- cotransporter. In addition, we found a depolarizing shift of the GABA reversal potential in the CamKII-cre::PTEN^flox/flox mouse model of drug-resistant epilepsy, suggesting that enhanced GABAergic inputs might depolarize dysmorphic neurons. Thus, imbalance of synaptic excitation and inhibition of dysmorphic neurons may contribute to seizure genesis in type II FCD.
Animals ; Drug Resistant Epilepsy/surgery* ; Epilepsy/pathology* ; Malformations of Cortical Development/pathology* ; Malformations of Cortical Development, Group I ; Mice ; Neurons/pathology* ; Seizures/pathology*